Coverage of "troubled children" running riot and terrorising communities was permeating much of the British media. View Summary

Coverage of "troubled children" running riot and terrorising communities was permeating much of the British media. Barnardo's faced the challenge of convincing people to donate money to help these "teenage tearaways". To do so, it sought to challenge deep-seated prejudices held by the public. This required not just telling people they were wrong, but giving them positive reasons to re-evaluate their opinions. During the first stage of communications, the charity developed a short film, entitled "Hunting", which used real comments left by readers on newspaper websites, and put them in the mouths of suburbanites with shotguns as they stalked their prey: children. The charity also utilised journalists to amplify and disseminate its message. This was followed up by a series of interactive films, and a lead TV ad, which started by conforming to the commonly-held stereotype, and ended by showing the vulnerability of the child in question, in an effort to stop viewers thinking in absolutes. These films were played back more than 200,000 times on YouTube, and Barnardo's also enjoyed a substantial increase in spontaneous awareness, large amounts of press and broadcast coverage, and an uptick in searches on Google.

Heart attacks kill 94,000 people a year in the UK. Many of those deaths are caused by "patient delay" - where people having a heart attack fail to call 999 immediately. View Summary

Heart attacks kill 94,000 people a year in the UK. Many of those deaths are caused by "patient delay" - where people having a heart attack fail to call 999 immediately. The problem is that people don't know the full range of symptoms, and so don't realise they're having a heart attack. Historically, campaigns - particularly communications campaigns - have been unsuccessful in changing behaviour. The British Heart Foundation believed it could overcome this problem by raising awareness of the full range of heart attack symptoms. This meant focusing on as many symptoms as possible, targeting a broad audience, and creating a real impact with viewers. To achieve all of these aims, it was decided a "simulation" should be used, to demonstrate exactly what someone having a heart attack really looked like. A combination of the specific brief and budgetary limitations meant it was decided that, rather than using a number of longer spots, this film would take the form of a one-off "event", being shown in full, just once, on ITV1. Over 6 million people saw the film, and a third of this audience tuned in specifically for this purpose. Tracking studies showed that the film had a near 100% recall rate among those consumers who watched it, and it has since been adopted by a wide range of other organisations, and viewed thousands of times online.

Childhood obesity rates in the UK are growing at a rapid rate, a trend that increasingly threatens both the current and future health of this age-group. View Summary

Childhood obesity rates in the UK are growing at a rapid rate, a trend that increasingly threatens both the current and future health of this age-group. Anti-obesity campaigns typically focus on telling kids about what they can and can't eat. This approach, however, is largely flawed, not least because most children actually already know what is and isn't good for them, but feel invincible when it comes to long-term health threats. Moreover, being told is not how kids learn – they prefer to learn through exploration and play. To tap into this trend, the British Heart Foundation created Yoobot, an online game allowing children to "play" with the future consequences of their diet by controlling a mini-version of themselves. Following the game's launch, more than a million children played Yoobot, making it as popular as Super Mario Bros, Wii Fit and Nintendo DS Braining Training. Nearly half of 11-13 year olds said they enjoyed playing the game because it was a fun way to learn, while 78% of the campaign's target audience who did so said they had improved their diets, a result factually demonstrated through food diary studies.

Comparethemarket.com, a price comparison website focusing on the car insurance sector, was relatively late to market, had no clear point of differentiation, and was being outspent by its main rivals. View Summary

Comparethemarket.com, a price comparison website focusing on the car insurance sector, was relatively late to market, had no clear point of differentiation, and was being outspent by its main rivals. The brand name was also problematic, as research revealed consumers found it to be largely "unmemorable". As the category norm, as far as advertising was concerned, was to focus on generic benefits applicable to all sites, it meant that rational appeals were unlikely to have a substantial impact. The insurance sector itself actually showed a possible way forward. Many firms in this sector had developed a "brand icon". More powerfully, Cadbury's "Gorilla" had shown the power of genuine innovation to generate both affection and respect. As a result, Comparethemarket.com developed the idea of Comparethemeerkat.com, headed by Aleksandr Orlov, the eccentric, loveable meerkat, as its lead character. Social media was at the heart of the campaign, especially Facebook and Twitter, with fresh content being made available via these sources at regular intervals. The campaign achieved all of its twelve month objectives in just nine weeks, and was the number one in terms of spontaneous awareness and consideration, with quote volumes rising by 83%, and cost per visit falling by 73%.

5

Department for Transport – a very uncomfortable feeling: developing a speed campaign for the DfT

Despite the fact a wide variety of anti-speeding campaigns have been run in the last few years, most British drivers typically think its OK to speed, even though the rational reasons for not doing so have been clearly presented to them. View Summary

Despite the fact a wide variety of anti-speeding campaigns have been run in the last few years, most British drivers typically think its OK to speed, even though the rational reasons for not doing so have been clearly presented to them. Interviews conducted with drivers at the end of their journeys by the Department for Transport indicated that most were acutely aware of the reasons why reducing their speed was a good idea, even when they had just broken the speed limit while driving. Simply telling people the facts was obviously not enough to change behaviour. As such, the DfT aimed to make the shift from rational to emotional. This required going beyond previous communications, and moving people, making them feel agitated, and uncomfortable. Research showed that the possibility of living with the guilt of killing another person while driving had this effect. The resultant TV ad focused on a driver who was responsible for the death of a child in this way, demonstrating he would have to "live with it" for the rest of his life. TV, radio, outdoor and online ads were used to "haunt" drivers wherever they went, and initial results showed there was 78% campaign recognition, with around half of consumers also agreeing it made them think of having to cope with the guilt after having such an accident.

6

Stella Artois - sometimes it’s not what you say, or even how you say it. It’s where you set it

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

Account Planning Group - (UK), Bronze, Creative Strategy Awards, 2009

In this campaign by Mother, Stella Artois 4% aimed to break out from its usual rural brand imagery and distinguish itself from other 4% lagers. View Summary

In this campaign by Mother, Stella Artois 4% aimed to break out from its usual rural brand imagery and distinguish itself from other 4% lagers. It opted for a Sixties French Riviera context in film and in print to communicate the product’s functional benefit of smoothness and to provide the visual backdrop for the escapades of a central fall guy character. The campaign exceeded its launch targets and helped Stella Artois’s overall market share grow in two successive quarters.

7

Eurostar – the Somers Town story

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

Account Planning Group - (UK), Gold, Creative Strategy Awards, 2009

Eurostar wanted to raise awareness that its main London terminal had moved to St Pancras, which had been backed by a £1.2bn investment. View Summary

Eurostar wanted to raise awareness that its main London terminal had moved to St Pancras, which had been backed by a £1.2bn investment. While ths brief provided a lot of "new news", and a rational benefit of improved travelling times, the size of the building project was hard to capture in a traditional TV spot. As such, in order to captre the range of emotions that were attached to the new Eurostar, it was decided that a very different strategy was required, in the form of a film. Having considered traditional modes of brand involvement in movies, such as financial placement, visual placement and audio placement, it was decided to move beyond these tools to "emotional placement", with a story based around the feelings Eurostar could in some way help evoke. Scriptwriter Paul Fraser and director Shane Meadows brought the story to life, and the result was Somers Town. The film won a variety of awards, and ended up as the second highest grossing British independent at the box office. It has also run on major broadcast networks, and sold well on DVD, making it a commercial success. A survey also showed that predisposition to travel on Eurostar was 40% higher among people who had viewed Somers Town than people who hadn't, and generated a goodwill that will be key to Eurostar's future.

The Economist needed to attract newer, younger readers. Working with AMV BBDO, it targeted "Generation Why" – a group of intellectual curious twenty somethings drawn to a disparate range of subjects. View Summary

The Economist needed to attract newer, younger readers. Working with AMV BBDO, it targeted "Generation Why" – a group of intellectual curious twenty somethings drawn to a disparate range of subjects. A cinema ad and a planned online application put this idea into creative form.

While Indian brides have traditionally been defined in terms of being self-sacrificing and dutiful, the seismic changes that have taken place in the country in recent years have rendered this image largely out-of-date. View Summary

While Indian brides have traditionally been defined in terms of being self-sacrificing and dutiful, the seismic changes that have taken place in the country in recent years have rendered this image largely out-of-date. Similarly, while wedding rings have normally been made out of gold, the DTC wanted to encourage an increased use of diamond rings, and thus improve the revenues it derived from a huge potential sales area. Rather than creating a preference for diamond jewellery, it was decided to try and drive a broader cultural shift, in line with the new attitudes and beliefs of brides. As a result of the "Diamond Bride" campaign, 73% of brides said they would be willing to replace gold with diamonds for their wedding jewellery. Furthermore, 95% of brides agreed with the notion that "this is a vision of the bride I want to be. This is for me. This is me." Sales in the overall wedding diamond jewellery category rose by 30%, exceeding the growth rate of the overall diamond jewellery, which reached 20%.

10

Volkswagen – A continuous focus on the ideal visitor experience: account planning the new Volkswagen.co.uk

In 2007 Volkswagen and Tribal DDB London refreshed the car-maker’s UK website in a bid to increase its share of internet visits. View Summary

In 2007 Volkswagen and Tribal DDB London refreshed the car-maker’s UK website in a bid to increase its share of internet visits. This case study shows how planners focused on car buyers' experience of the site to offer greater personalisation and less information clutter. As a result, Volkwagen.co.uk became the most-visited car-maker’s website in the UK, and the ratio of those taking test drives to buying improved by 8%.

Royal Mail is one of the UK's best-known brands, but has also recently faced two sizeable challenges. View Summary

Royal Mail is one of the UK's best-known brands, but has also recently faced two sizeable challenges. The first was the formal introduction of competition in its category, taking away 20% of the market. The growth of the internet has also broken the traditional link between economic growth and mail volumes. Through an analysis of its business, Royal Mail discovered that the true value was in "fulfilment mail", and the benefit of this to business was growth. As a result, it adopted a new positioning statement, based around the tagline "growth solutions for better business", which displayed its aspiration to become a partner for business growth. Based on provisional results, it became clear the campaign had begun to work in three ways. The first was bringing in direct sales leads worth £5 million. Secondly, it contributed to the development of online as a self-serve hub, and during the campaign, traffic to royalmail.com increased by 50%, with a microsite also enjoying high levels of interest. It also dramatically shifted perceptions, as brand appeal moved from 38% to 55%.

For this campaign for skin cancer charity, Skcin, McCann Erickson created a hoax online product targeting obsessed “tanorexics” at risk from harmful over-exposure to sunbeds. The agency used PR and viral techniques to generate extensive press coverage and achieve almost a quarter of a million hits to its website in the first four weeks alone.

Nokia was under-performing in key markets including Russia, China, Brazil and the UK, and it was imperative the launch of the Supernova helped redress this trend. View Summary

Nokia was under-performing in key markets including Russia, China, Brazil and the UK, and it was imperative the launch of the Supernova helped redress this trend. The company thus aimed to get to know its users better, and found an innovative way to do this - looking through the material on their phones, from their friends and contacts to messages, photographs, videos and music. This revealed that there had been a re-drawing of personal boundaries, with people's phones documenting all the drama in their lives, almost like a celebrity magazine. As a result, a campaign website, SomebodyelsesPhone.com, was developed, telling the fictional story of three different characters as portrayed through their phones. This portal attracted 1.27 million visits, with an average dwell time of five minutes, and 8% of people became "lifelong visitors" who returned continuously throughout the duration of communications. Some 7,000 people also signed up as "fans" of the campaign on Facebook, with 30,000 mentions also being recorded on a wide variety of blogs.

This paper details how "Keep Walking", the global campaign for Johnnie Walker, was adapted for the Chinese market. View Summary

This paper details how "Keep Walking", the global campaign for Johnnie Walker, was adapted for the Chinese market. China presented a great challenge to the brand, as the culture there was very different from the Western markets where the campaign had originated. To fully understand the potential issues, a four-level model of cultural difference was constructed and analysed, in order to yield the cultural, behavioural and ephemeral levels of Chinese culture as pertaining to both the whisky category as a whole, and the specific concept of "personal progress" which "Keep Walking" was based on. As a result, the endline of communications was redefined as a toast, or a "pact between men to help each other's future progress". This idea made "Keep Walking" relevant to Chinese drinking occasions and the Chinese concept of progress, and drove 7 million unique visitors to the Johnnie Walker website and producing strong tracking results across China (and Taiwan), beating previous norms.

"Halo 3 Believe" set out to have the biggest opening sales in the entertainment industry by deploying a cross-platform approach to story-telling. View Summary

"Halo 3 Believe" set out to have the biggest opening sales in the entertainment industry by deploying a cross-platform approach to story-telling. This phased campaign by McCann Erickson centred on the game’s lead character and employed events, PR, paid-for online, television, cinema and print advertising and multiple other channels. As a result, the game recorded £84m of opening sales, beating the previous record held by the Spiderman movie.

16

Axe – wake up service: how communications helped make Axe part of Japanese guys' morning routine

In 2007, Axe successfully launched in Japan. But while the brand recruited lots of users, post-launch research showed that guys in Japan only sprayed it a few times a week - about half as often as users in some other parts of the world. View Summary

In 2007, Axe successfully launched in Japan. But while the brand recruited lots of users, post-launch research showed that guys in Japan only sprayed it a few times a week - about half as often as users in some other parts of the world. There was thus a huge opportunity to almost double sales if existing Axe users could be persuaded to spray everyday. Achieving this aim meant making Axe a part of young guys' morning routine - the natural time for Axe usage. In studying the Japanese target, it was found that most Japanese guys use their mobile phone as an alarm clock. As a result, the "Axe Wake Up Service" was created, a sexy mobile alarm application that gave guys a daily wake-up call reminding them to spray Axe. This was backed by a multi-channel marketing campaign. The campaign website received 3.5 million page views, and over 27,000 guys called to download the mobile application. Most importantly, the purchase repeat rate increased by 27 percentage points compared with the period before communications began.

17

PG Tips – the chimp also rises

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

Account Planning Group - (UK), Bronze, Creative Strategy Awards, 2009

PG was an iconic British teabag brand, but the impact of its advertising had gradually been fading, not least because it had struggled to devise a creative idea which was as funny, topical and relevant as the spots featuring chimps that it had relied on for decades. View Summary

PG was an iconic British teabag brand, but the impact of its advertising had gradually been fading, not least because it had struggled to devise a creative idea which was as funny, topical and relevant as the spots featuring chimps that it had relied on for decades. In an effort to give the British public "reasons to put the kettle on", it was decided to tap into the traditions that had made this campaign such a success, but also to make them more modern and up-to-date. To do so, it used the leverage of a highly-popular communications strategy previously employed by the now-defunct ITV Digital, featuring the comedian Johnny Vegas and "Monkey", a talking puppet which allowed it to hark back to an important part of its history. As a result of the campaign, PG Tips reasserted itself as the number one tea brand in both volume and value sales. Other results included high levels of awareness, as well as considerable popularity, among consumers.

The RSPCA was typically perceived by Australians as a charity with smiling inspectors which helped cute animals, but the overwhelming air of positivity also contributed to a popular lethargy, with a potential impact on donation levels. View Summary

The RSPCA was typically perceived by Australians as a charity with smiling inspectors which helped cute animals, but the overwhelming air of positivity also contributed to a popular lethargy, with a potential impact on donation levels. This was particularly damaging given the organisation was in millions of dollars worth of debt. In a highly competitive market, it became clear the RSPCA was actually underselling itself. The reality behind the surface was that it undertakes a range of hazardous tasks, not just in animal welfare but in human welfare too - from domestic violence and drug raids to violent individuals and child abuse. Communications which focused on these areas of its operation could shake up popular perceptions, and had the benefit of not needing to "spin" the organisation's role, as telling the truth was much more compelling. The campaign attracted mainstream media attention, and sparked exactly the sort of dialogue that had been hoped for. In the first three weeks of the campaign, the RSPCA also received in excess of $550,000 in donations, well beyond what the figure that had been anticipated.

This paper discusses a campaign for Nike which aimed to connect the brand with a new audience in a new way. View Summary

This paper discusses a campaign for Nike which aimed to connect the brand with a new audience in a new way. Nike had developed a new range of kit focusing on the area of small-sided football, which has gained rapidly in popularity in the UK, and wanted to drive interest and sales among consumers. In an effort to move beyond selling shirts, the company aimed to make a bigger brand statement at the grassroots of the game, which takes place less on pitches, and more in urban enclaves and estates. Nike had always struggled to communicate with "urban footballers", who are a far from homogenous group, are unpredictable, and demand authenticity. Based on the understanding that football was an escape from the pressures of life, and on the world of "urban footballers", it was decided to take an unscripted approach, and simply film real-life games and events as they happened. As part of this spontaneous process, footage was caught of a young footballer "nutmegging" Wayne Rooney, the England player. A substantial amount of PR coverage resulted, and this incident also gave Nike a cultural cache with its audience. The moment was replayed over half-a-million times on YouTube, while the total bank of content was viewed over three million times, and 16,000 players signed up for Nike's "Show Your Five" tournament.

Air Action Vigorsol was the best-selling chewing gum brand in Italy, a position it had enjoyed for a number of years. View Summary

Air Action Vigorsol was the best-selling chewing gum brand in Italy, a position it had enjoyed for a number of years. Like every other chewing gum market, the category in Italy was largely impulse-driven, meaning top-of-mind awareness was key. Traditionally, Vigorsol had created popular TV ads which communicated the main product benefit - namely, that it delivered a refreshing blast of cold air when chewed - in a light-hearted fashion. By 2007, however, both internet and 3G mobile phone penetration were growing rapidly in the country, meaning television was not delivering the same levels of long-lasting awareness as previously. To address this problem, it was decided Vigorsol should look to develop an "entertainment property" rather than an "advertising property". Ultimately, this took the form of Cippi, a chipmunk with an "incredible powers to create icy farts", an ability given to him by Air Action Vigorsol. A buzz about the campaign was created by seeding exclusive material with influential bloggers, with TV also creating a "big bang" at launch, and a range of other digital content, such as online games and mobile apps, helping to "fill in the gaps" between these forms of media.

21

Sony – the story of why: how asking the right questions helped Sony Australia become "internet famous"

Sony Australia wanted to market its Sony Net Share cam product to young Australians. Working with Saatchi & Saatchi, it arranged for Hugh Thomas, a popular YouTube poster, to use the product, and encourage other YouTubers to create and share video diaries. View Summary

Sony Australia wanted to market its Sony Net Share cam product to young Australians. Working with Saatchi & Saatchi, it arranged for Hugh Thomas, a popular YouTube poster, to use the product, and encourage other YouTubers to create and share video diaries. The work drove YouTube traffic to Sony-relevant sites, increased exposure to Sony branding on YouTube and achieved 550,000 views and thousands of comments on Thomas’s YouTube page in four weeks.

As a retailer facing up to the economic downturn, the temptation for PC World was to continue focusing on its competitive prices and products, and also to champion promotions and attempt to drive volume sales. View Summary

As a retailer facing up to the economic downturn, the temptation for PC World was to continue focusing on its competitive prices and products, and also to champion promotions and attempt to drive volume sales. However, the company opted to take the opposite approach, and build its brand instead. In order to achieve this goal, it developed a platform based around a property over which it had a degree of ownership in its category - the idea of "world". Its advertising executions thus attempted to reinterpret the term, and imbue it with a valuable new meaning. The creative looked at the "worlds" of different people, and how PC World had helped them enhance their lives. The campaign ran across TV - featuring in a number of high-profile shows - as well as in cinema and on radio. Online and in-store components backed up this message, delivering strong results for the PC World brand as a whole.

Teenage guys account for a big proportion of Lynx's sales, and the company has typically appealed to this audience through the promise of helping them in the mating game. View Summary

Teenage guys account for a big proportion of Lynx's sales, and the company has typically appealed to this audience through the promise of helping them in the mating game. The rise of social networks, and the ubiquity of mobile phones among teenagers, however, had changed the rules of the game, making it hyper-connected, "always on" and played across both real and virtual contexts. As digital media changed consumer behaviour, the obvious solution was to develop a digital strategy for the brand. A new type of planning team, made up of engagement and account planners, evolved the brand promise from the traditional 'emotional selling proposition' to an 'interactive selling proposition'. Lynx's promise of enhanced confidence to seduce girls was re-expressed as an interactive mating game toolkit, featuring mobile apps and other content that could help guys break the ice with girls. The mobile application received over 355,000 downloads, around half of which came from viral distribution. Across the broader campaign network, there were a further 1.5 million people viewing related content, showing Lynx had strengthened its powerful connection with teens.

24

Orange Gold Spots – Don't let a mobile phone ruin your movie

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

Account Planning Group - (UK), Bronze, Creative Strategy Awards, 2009

Orange wanted to deepen its engagement with the youth market, but while the mobile phone was an essential part of the lives of this age-group, they were hard to reach in a manner that was both authentic and effective. View Summary

Orange wanted to deepen its engagement with the youth market, but while the mobile phone was an essential part of the lives of this age-group, they were hard to reach in a manner that was both authentic and effective. The company thus sought to find something that it could do for youth culture that no other mobile provider could. Rather than the obvious, such as skate-parks, festivals and new music, it looked to an unrecognised opportunity within the current brand plan. It had already invested significantly in film through its sponsorship of BAFTA, and also owned the 'Gold Spot' - the 5-second announcement ad that reminded you to turn your phone off - before the start of a film. A high percentage of young pay as you go users frequently went to the cinema, and this gave Orange a chance to maximise the value of its previous expenditure at the same time. The introduction of Orange Wednesdays, offering two-for-one cinema tickets, and a series of knowing Gold Spots, acknowledging that product placement could ruin films, helped the brand communicate in a unique way. By 2006, Orange was the brand most associated with cinema in the UK, and seven years on since the start of the campaign, it is still seeing the fruits of being accepted, both in cinema and wider youth culture.

25

Kent County Council – welcome to a new type of communication channel: welcome to House

Includes video content

Recommended by Warc editors

Trends

Best Practice

James Joice, Account Planning Group - (UK), Gold, Best understanding of business and use of numbers, Creative Strategy Awards, 2009

This paper describes the use of a new type of "channel" by Kent County Council in an attempt to communicate more effectively with teenagers on matters such as unprotected sex, drinking, drugs and smoking. View Summary

This paper describes the use of a new type of "channel" by Kent County Council in an attempt to communicate more effectively with teenagers on matters such as unprotected sex, drinking, drugs and smoking. The campaign had a modest budget, and was required to compete with a cacophony of other "helpful" messages bombarding teenagers on a daily basis. The Council also ran a large number of pre-existing services targeted at this age-group. As such, it was decided there was a need to create a channel which linked the existing messages with the services that were available. Having studied the interactions between teenagers, their friends and support services, it was decided this should take the form of an environment which utilised teenagers' most influential medium - conversations - and be somewhere they felt comfortable. Research revealed that most teens saw "a mate's house" as meeting this need. As a result, six disused high-street shops were converted into "real world portals" and each was named as a "House" where young people could come and request information. Visitor numbers quickly increased, anti-social crime decreased, and other Councils have since expressed an interest in adapting the project for their own areas of operation.